Happy Birthday, Princess

My daughter Sofia will be eight tomorrow. How time flies. She still owes her mother eleven days in the hospital - that was how long my wife had to spend time in the hospital. When Sofia was born, she was pink. Pink. Pink. Pink. Then after a day or two, she turned yellow. Yup, jaundice. She had to spend a few days under the UV lights. Not a pretty sight really, a newborn under those ghostly blue rays. But common, I was told. She is very very fair. Over the years people thought at least one of her parents is a mat salleh. Yeah, sure, that mat salleh, my wife would point at me. I don't look like no mat salleh, more like a mat salah. People would do double takes when the four of us go for walks around the compound where we stayed when I was posted in a neighbouring country. I know what you are thinking, I'd say. She's not adopted, she's ours, I'd say under my breath. So would my wife. There is nothing strange about that. My wife is very fair. Both our mothers are very fair. My father was fair too. So was I but not anymore, not after years of football, rugby and working offshore. I have written before on why she was named Sofia. And it is still the most beautiful name in the whole world. She does not like to tie her hair, she prefers it to hang freely. I like it tied up neatly, so that it would not get in her way. It's OK, she said, it only gets into her eyes all the time and into her mouth only when she eats. She prefers fish, unlike her brother, who prefers chicken. Right, you guessed it, just like her father. She had her first taste of mee goreng pedas when she was two years old and has not stopped since. She puts older people to shame when she eats masak asam, sambal belacan (a controlled item, since she is not even eight years old) and anything goreng berlada. We have to cut down on sambal belacan since she'd want to eat it too so we quit making it as frequently as we used to. She can swim a bit now, a far cry from the days when she'd say "nak mimming" whenever I'm home from work and she'd just splash around in the shallow end. We had a hard time telling her that eating Oreos and swimming at the same time is a no no and no, she may not dip the Oreos into the pool before eating them. But then she was only two years old or so. She loves the boat that we sometimes take to go to town. When she was about one and a half or so, the route out of our compound would pass by the homes of some locals who had a somewhat motley collection of animals. The most common animal we saw were dogs. "Dock", she'd say everytime. Yup, those are dogs alright, we'd say. After a few times, even before the dogs were in view, she'd say "dock". Which is fine. Then for a while, a nanny goat and her kids would replace the dogs but she'd still say "dock". Her brother would tell her that those are not dogs (he could say the word dog properly, after all, he was four years old then) but those are goats. But one day a sow and her piglets appeared instead, she still said "dock" and her brother shrieked out in laughter. He was still laughing when we reached town. Even now, I can still hear his squeals of delight, "Adik ni, those are not dogs, they are pigs!!!". "Dock", she'd say again.

Her brother took in her presence quite well. He enjoyed the hospital food. He was the only one though. I must be the only person to have eaten McDonalds' burgers four times in a single day. It was hard to coax a three year old to leave his mother and new baby sister and head for his grandparents house. In another way, it was kind of difficult for him since he had never been away from his mother and over most of the eleven days, each night before we go to sleep he'd ask me if I'd have to go the next morning and leave him (with my mother-in-law). And on many days I had to lie since I had to go to work and he'd wake up alone, with me, the only familiar face left, not around any longer. It broke my heart knowing he'd cry no matter what his Mama Wan (that's what he calls my mother-in-law) does. But four trips daily to McDonalds did the trick. Pay back time. Over that period, we ended up with four Little Bo Peeps, five Dinosaurs and four Woody's. They are still around, terrorising the other toys, I guess.

And oh, in about three weeks' time, it will be my son's birthday. He'll be eleven. Oh boy, eleven year olds....... That's a whole different tale.